The Liberal Democrat’s former business secretary Vince Cable claimed the chancellor “clearly has no confidence in the economic strategy of the government, because he knows that leaving the single market and customs union has the potential to devastate the U.K. economy,” Sky News reported.

He added: “If Britain enters a second economic storm, it will be Theresa May’s economic storm. You can’t have a hard Brexit and a strong economy.”

The ONS publication is the most important collection of economic data to be published ahead of the June 8 general election in the U.K. and marks a worse-than-expected economic slowdown of 0.4 percent predicted by a Bloomberg survey of economists.

Annabelle Dickson contributed to this article.

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YellowSubmarine

Vince Cable and John McDonnell are obviously ignoring the obvious comparison. Last years figures ( first three months) and the year before that had the same growth rate. UK missed GDP estimate by 0.1 % on expected and it may yet be revised upward. Although it is a last ditch attempt to blame brexit on stopping the economy by an increasingly desperate remain camp.

Also manufacturing was up 0.5%, I don’t expect the dynamic duo will be pointing that number out today.